About us

The Wheelchair Users Group is a Registered charity formed in 1992 by wheelchair users.

Registered Charity Number: 1064955

The Group is an independent not-for-profit charitable organisation; all the services we provide are funded from advertising revenue, sponsorship, fund raising activities, membership fees, small grants from local councils and by donations from members and supporters.

The mission of the Wheelchair Users Group is:

“To Empower and Enable Wheelchair Users to lead full and active lives by helping them obtain the right mobility equipment from both the statutory and private sector”.

Membership Area:
Wheelchair users living and working in the County of Kent

Our Principals:
We are a ‘user’ led organisation that is run and controlled by disabled people, this is reflected by the current management team of six, five being full-time wheelchair users. We also have our own Access Advisor, Access Auditor and a Mobility Advisor for assessments

Our Service Provision:
The group runs a FreePhone support help-line and provides an information service covering all aspects of wheelchair and scooter use. ‘Real Power’ newsletter issued 2/3 times a year.

Run Folkestone Shopmobility with support of volunteers, providing mobility scooters and manual wheelchairs for shopping and leisure activities in and around the town centre area. Scheme is open Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and booking is recommended.

The group facilitates the Countywide Wheelchair User Forum, working in partnership with the NHS Wheelchair Service on the provision and future development of that service. If you have a wheelchair provided by the NHS Wheelchair Service in Canterbury, Dartford, Folkestone, Maidstone, Medway or Tunbridge Wells we are interested in your views. The group provides advice and information on how to access and use the NHS service, including details on the provision of electric powered indoor/outdoor wheelchairs (EPIOC’s) and the voucher scheme.

Our Outreach Service:
The Wheelchair Users Group have a small group of volunteers who will go into schools, colleges, clubs and associations to talk about their experiences of being a wheelchair user in a society that caters almost exclusively for non-disabled people. For their talks in schools they take along an active #user wheelchair and a mobility scooter so that the children and adults can experience using a mobility aid at first hand.

Local access group role:
The Wheelchair Users Group are working to improve access to the built environment for all disabled people in the Shepway District Council area.

Our Constituants:
The population of Kent is 1,565,960, there are 161,155 people with a long-term illness or disability living in the county, which is 10.3% of the population. There are an estimated 25,000 wheelchair users in Kent.

The Wheelchair Users Group is registered under the Data Protection Act 1984 (Registration Number X4144883)

We are a member of RADAR & NFSUK (The National Federation of Shopmobility)